Discourse Analysis: For a Better Understanding of the Social Meanings of Texts - Essay Example

Dis Analysis: For a Better Understanding of the Social Meanings of Texts Introduction Media imparts knowledge through the news stories that it serves up to the public everyday. The knowledge derived from these texts will be more meaningful if the public goes beyond absorbing the basic information and language use to engage in discourse analysis for a deconstructive reading and interpretation. Texts have meanings that may be overt or hidden, and analyzing them as written can bring about a different perspective and a deeper understanding of whose interests they are serving (McGregor, 2003). Discourse analysis is defined as the study of language use beyond the boundaries of a sentence since it is concerned with the interrelationships between language and society (Slembrouck, 2006). The purpose of such analysis is not to provide a definitive solution but to expand our knowledge horizon and make us realize our own shortcomings and unacknowledged personal agendas or motivations as well as those of others (Howarth, 2000). In effect, it helps us develop a critical understanding of how texts or utterances relate to social contexts. To demonstrate how discourse analysis provides a richer understanding of the socio-cultural ramifications of texts, this paper applies the process on two news items culled from separate Australian dailies, the Daily Telegraph and The Sun-Herald (see Appendices). These texts were selected for the study because of many resemblances in terms of genre, register, tenor, mode, interpersonal meanings, attitude and the social environment being portrayed. They also report on the same events and address themselves to the same type of participants or audience. Discourse Analysis Both texts selected for this study qualify as story genre, which is hard news that chronicles events and suggest their social relevance. This social connection was left unsaid but it is there in the register, the mode, tenor, attitude and interpersonal meanings of the sample texts. According to one study, all journalists possess mental models about the world that they express only in small helpings. The rest of the picture is supposed to be filled by the knowledge scripts and models of media users (Dijk, 1991). In the study texts, the world being projected by the journalists is an absurd and anarchic one where wedding ceremonies are increasingly equated with and an invitation to violence. This reflects in the mode, which conveys the meaning through the choice of such phrases as "marriage mayhem" and "marriage brawl." The word mayhem itself suggests These word combinations are suggestive and rhetorical, and exposes how journalists pass judgment based on their own attitude or values. In effect, the writers of the study texts take an evaluative stance through media to warn the participants against a new threat to society. It also demonstrates how journalists construe reality and position readers ideologically. In organizing the texts as coherent and cohesive wholes, the reporters of the Daily Telegraph and Sunday-Herald developed their chosen theme by adding graphic details on the outcome of the violence, giving the impression that the situation has crazily gone out of hand. The text as a story genre comprises a headline, a lead idea, body and wrap-up. We find what happened in the lead, how and why it happened in the body, and why it affects us in the wrap-up. The tenor invokes moral panic Except for lacerations sustained by the victims, no one was actually killed in the two separate stabbing incidents but the tenor of the stories suggested a bloody carnage. In the first text, 70 to 80 people engaged in a free-for-all while about 100 people were involved in a brawl in the other text. Dozens of 20 police cars and helicopters swarmed at one scene, and at the other a car was destroyed and bloodied items of clothing were all over the place. These images and texts are interrelated and achieve the meta-functional meanings that the writers want to convey. They also realize the context of culture genres in written discourse. In the study texts, the writers were insinuating that violent incidents associated with weddings are on the rise such that peace-loving citizens should start to worry and address the emerging problem. Media is not above exaggerating events through what sociologists call "moral panic." The term gained popular usage in UK after the infamous clash between the Mods and Rockers bikers at Clacton beach resort in the mid-1960s. All the damage done was a few vandalized beach huts and broken windows but media accounts the following day made out the event as a "Day of Terror (Daily Telegraph)" and an "invasion of Wild Ones (Daily Mirror)." The reports used such uncalled-for descriptions as "riot, siege, orgy, screaming mob," in effect blowing up and sensationalizing the event for no other worthwhile reason than to boost readership. Another case of a more recent vintage involves singer Brian Harvey of the East 17 Band, who admitted in a TV interview that he had used the drug Ecstasy. Harvey was promptly branded a heretic by media and his band's songs banned from 13 British radio stations. It turned out that Harvey tried Ecstasy only once out of curiosity. More such moral panics are expected to be created by media not because of its inner logic but because "our society as presently structured will continue to generate problems for its members (White, 1998)." Moral panic is described as "a form of collective behaviour in which a condition, episode, person or group of persons emerges to become a threat to societal values and interest." The theory of discourse analysis as formulated by Michel Foucault and developed by Dijk (1991) and later epistemologists describe the relationship between the press and popular culture as "complex and dynamic." In this view, the popular press is essentially a set of discourses claiming the power and authority to speak on behalf of the people, but this discursive process is contradictory. The press may claim to speak from the people or on behalf of the people, which polarity is reflected in the connotations of the different forms of the popular. The first comes with an aura of authenticity, a qualitative aspect; the second, with a negative connotation of a commodified inauthentic, exploitated mass. One of the tasks of discourse analysis is to examine the flow of influence between these two modes since popular culture is a difficult place to own. It is difficult for the elite, because of the resistance it encounters from the people and difficult for the people because of the encroachment of the political and commercial motives of the elite on what they perceive as their popular space (Howarth, 2000). In the literature on discourse analysis, genre is defined as the message form or content and displays the mode of writing, which is different from spoken discourse. This relates with the mode, which demonstrates the role that language plays to develop the genre, and the tenor, which describes the social role relationship between language users. As for the register, it is the way writers persuade readers to a certain point of view, which, in our study, refers to wedding parties as possible scene of crime and violence. All of these, of course, are interrelated with attitude, interpersonal meanings and participants. In attitude, the writers associated their emotional response with the participants while interpersonal meanings are nothing more than attitudinal epithets (Lemke, 1992). The lead paragraphs in the Daily Telegraph and Sun-Herald media pieces appear to create moral panic out of two violent episodes that have a wedding party as common backdrop. The writers then proceeded to develop this lead by using words and images that convey certainty or authority ("three people were stabbed at the first wedding in The 54-year-old was arrested after the stabbing outside a wedding at a function centre a brawl involving about 100 people at a wedding reception in Sydney"), emphasise the havoc created by the violence ("an angry crowd had gathered up to 80 people took to the streetsa brawl involving about 100 people"), and using what McGregor (2003) refers to as selective voices while leaving out other voices. This omission of an angle or point of view in the text of a story genre may be typified in the reporting in Canadian newspapers of the increasing incidence of violence against teachers in Nova Scotia in 2003. As chronicled by McGregor (2003), the tenor of the stories was that teachers "faced fists and threats" from students. The lead was developed such that 94 teachers in Nova Scotia were reported to have been hit by students, 59 had been kicked, 116 shoved and 26 others threatened or assault by a student with a weapon. Thus, the texts cited only the numbers and left out the statistics such that the problem became a workplace issue with the teachers forced to work in a difficult and dangerous environment. If statistics were given preference over numbers, the news reports may read: 85 percent of the teachers in the area have not been hit by students, 90 percent have not been kicked, 81 percent not shoved, and 96 percent not threatened in any way. Had the writers used statistics instead of numbers in developing their lead, McGregor (2003) said the scenario would have been different, with the issue becoming a social problem involving frustrated and dysfunctional children seeking attention and love. In applying this discourse analysis theory to the Daily Telegraph and Sun-Herald texts on violence related to wedding ceremonies, it would be interesting to see the statistics on how many wedding receptions in Sydney have been held without any incident. Off-hand, one can surmise that the stabbing at Sydney's southwest and Lidcombe were isolated incidents, and the persons involved may not be guests at the wedding parties at all but gate-crashers that were turned away. However, the writers of the news stories conveniently omitted this information because it would have spoiled the mode of their reports. Nonetheless, media is considered an authority such that its words are often taken as gospel truth by the public, who wields no such power. According to Lemke (1992) and White (1998), the words of texts carry the power that reflects the interests of those who write or speak. The words of those in power are taken as "self-evident truths" while the words of those out of power are dismissed as irrelevant or inappropriate (Dijk, 2000). To make the voice of the marginalised heard and expose the hidden agendas and motives that serve vested interests and maintain superiority, McGregor (2003) suggests analysis by first placing the text in its proper genre, which is the means by which an institution like media extends power. Then check out the register, or who the voice belongs to, which reveals what angle or point of view is presented. The headings and keywords will show how a concept is emphasised, what angles of the story and other voices have been left out. In the texts taken up for this study, the angles and voices that may have been left out include: 1) the principals in the two wedding ceremonies who may not be aware of the existence of those involved in skirmishes outside, 2) other residents in the neighbourhood other than the solitary David Bragg who described the disturbance as "a full-on thing," 3) police on the scene who may have seen things differently, and 4) attendants at Westmead and Liverpool hospitals who may have treated the victims only for minor cuts instead of "serious" wounds, as the texts described them. In sum, media writers create perspectives that influence how readers view events. They develop this perspective through selective heads, lead, sentences, phrases and words in a process called topicalisation that is an exercise of power. Thus, the writers may leave out certain information that does not suit their purpose. A good example may be the newspaper reports of a rally by employees of a government agency against abusive officials. Most newspaper accounts will devote about 10 sentences to the demands of the protestors but only 2 sentences to the views of the officials involved. This property of text is described as the agency, which can stay at the subconscious level unless made visible through discourse analysis (McGregor, 2003). References 1. Dijk, T. V. (1991). "Critical Studies in Racism and Migration." In Fascism and the Press, R. Miles (ed). New York:Routledge. 2. Forrester, M.A., Ramsden, C. & Reason, D. (1997). "Conversation and Discourse Analysis in Library and Information Services." Education for Life 15.4. 3. Howarth, D. (2000). "Discourse." Philadelphia PA: Open University Press. 4. Lemke, J.L. (1992). "Interpersonal Meaning in Discourse: Value Orientation." In Advances in Systemic Linguistics: Recent Theory and Practice. M. Davies & L. Ravelli (eds). London: Pinter Publishers. 5. McGregor, L.T. (2003). "Critical Discourse Analysis." Kappa Omicron Nu Forum, Vol. 15, No. 1. 6. Slembrouck, S. (2006). "What is meant by Discourse Analysis" Ghent University, Belgium. 7. White, P.R. (1998). "Telling Media Tales: The News Story as Rhetoric." University of Sydney. Appendices 1. Headline: 6 Slashed in marriage mayhem Source: Daily Telegraph Multiple stabbings at two separate Sydney weddings have left six guests injured in a night that also saw police called to a function centre where an angry crowd had gathered. A 54-year-old man Mount Druitt man has been charged after three people were stabbed at the first wedding in Sydney's southwest. A 19-year-old man has been charged with minor offences over the second incident in Lidcombe in which three men were stabbed. Riot police had to be called in when up to 80 people took to the streets in Lidcombe following that incident. The 54-year-old was arrested after the stabbing outside a wedding at a function centre on Station street in Liverpool yesterday at 7:45 p.m., police say. Police allege the male guest had become disruptive and was being escorted from the premises by three other guests - two men and one woman - when he produced a knife, slashing the two men then the woman. One man, a 28-year-old, sustained a severe laceration to his stomach while the other, 29, sustained a deep laceration to his left forearm. The woman, 27, sustained a stab wound to her stomach. All three remained in stable condition at Liverpool Hospital. The man was charged with three counts of maliciously inflicting grievous bodily harm. Bail has been refused and he will appear at Parramatta Bail Court today. Meanwhile, police are appealing for more information following the stabbings of three men in Lidcombe's Bridge Street. The trio was stabbed outside a wedding function centre after a fight between three guests - aged 18, 19 and 22 - and several other men. Violence erupted a short time later between 70-80 people who were concerned for the welfare of the injured men, police say. Police from Flemington Local Area Command attended the scene with assistance from PolAir, Dog Squad and the Public Order Riot Squad, with additional police from Parramatta and Holroyd local area commands. Lidcombe resident David Bragg said there were about 20 police cars and helicopters at the scene. "There were dozens of cop cars swarming the area," he said. "Lines of cops were pushing people out of the Lidcombe CBD. It was quite a full-on thing." All three injured men were taken to Westmead Hospital, where they underwent surgery. A 19-year-old Mount Druitt man was arrested by police at the scene and taken to Auburn police station for questioning. He was charged with resisting officer in execution of duty and failure to disclose identification. He was bailed to appear at Burwood Local Court on June 10. Anyone with information regarding the Lidcombe incident is urged to contact Flemington police. 2. Head: 3 stabbed during wedding brawl Source: The Sun-Herald Three men were stabbed during a brawl involving about 100 people at wedding reception in Sydney last night, police said. Ambulances were called to Bridge Street, Lidcombe at 9:50 p.m. A man was escorted from the Grand Westella reception centre when he allegedly stabbed the three. Witnesses said they saw a damaged car near the reception venue and a number of bloodstained items of clothing on the grounds. A 19-year-old and two 18-year-olds were taken to Liverpool Hospital. All are in serious but stable condition. An ambulance spokesman said one of the men had injuries to the chest and abdomen. A 54-year-old man was being questioned by police late last night. Read More